Chapter 9: Analytics

He looked at his watch impatiently as the elevator took them down to their meeting with the rest of his team. They were coming up on a merger, the largest one he had dealt with in years, and Sarah's first, and he meant for them all to be ready for it. Sarah had been nothing but exemplary in her role so far, but his entire team needed to be prepped for this and he had to be sure she was on point. If she faltered in either the paperwork or the upcoming meetings it would be a huge setback for the entire corporation. This had been the real reason he had hired her no matter how useful she was in other ways. He hadn't told her that of course, because he didn't want to spook her, but it was true all the same. At this moment he was gambling a not so small fortune on her abilities.

For her part Sarah was as serenely good spirited as she ever was and he was sure she had no idea how much her role in this mattered or she would be on edge. It was just as well that way. She would do her best regardless, and he would be sure to… gently prompt her to focus, it would be all she needed to keep it perfect, not that she had made a mistake yet. With her welcoming and agreeable personality it was no wonder she and Mokuba had hit it off so well. He supposed if nothing else positive had happened as a result of that fight it was something.

He and Mokuba had always gotten on well and easily. He would be the first to admit they were very different people, no doubt due to both their inborn natures and the rather brutal nurturing he had been exposed to with Gozuburo, but that had never seemed to matter. At least it hadn't seemed to matter until Mokuba was suddenly a teenaged boy with his own thoughts and ideas about what he wanted to be doing at any given moment. While his little brother was always willing to accompany him if he asked, he had been vanishing some evenings and weekends to do things on his own, or with his friends at school. This hadn't bothered him in any real sense, as it seemed perfectly normal even if he did miss his company during the few hours he was home, until he had almost been snatched right out of a very crowded arcade in the middle of the day that was only a block away from a police station. If it hadn't been for his very fortunate run in with Sarah he had no idea if Mokuba would even be alive right now.

Since then he and Mokuba had been butting heads every week or so. The friction had been increasing incrementally until the fight about his slipping grades that had his brother leaving the house without a word to him. Where he had once had a sweet tempered, affectionate, unwaveringly devoted boy at his side he now had a willful, independent, often bored teenager on his hands. A teenager that was easily as clever as he was when he had a mind to be and was refusing to listen to any sort of reason. He certainly didn't want Mokuba to be 'a captive in his own home', a direct quote during one of their arguments, but Mokuba's life was not typical in any way. If he was going to go out either he or Roland needed to go with him and stay close enough to keep an eye on things in public. That proposal had gone over as well as discussing bath time with a cat.

Baffled by this new and sometimes hostile version of his good natured brother he had been hovering uncertainly between a strategic retreat and a full out battle of wills. He knew either way he went it was going to get nasty and he sincerely did not want to fight with his brother. However, he was in an awkward position of brother and parent, and if it came down to his brother's safety he would become the disciplinarian even if it meant a real lock down. He almost flinched at the thought, but he had no idea what else to do. After Sarah left, and he was sure he had convinced her to tutor him, which may have gotten a bit out of hand, he had gone after Mokuba.

He found his brother sulking in his room with his radio blaring loud enough to make his ears bleed. Forcing his frustration over the whole situation down, because he was sure it wouldn't help, he stopped right inside the doorway and reached over to turn the radio off. As silence settled Mokuba sent him a sullen glare. He sucked a deep breath through his nose before speaking as he could feel his temper snapping. "We need to talk about this." He said at a reasonable volume. "You can't run off without telling me where you're going."

"You wouldn't listen to me about my test." Mokuba informed him. "So I figured why bother."

"I'm sure that's the reason." He said dryly. "As opposed to you simply wanting to gallivant about town with no supervision."

"I'm thirteen, Seto! I'm not a child!" Mokuba had leapt to his feet and had his fists clenched at his sides. "Stop treating me like one!"

"I'm very aware you're not a child!" He snapped back, his voice rising as he lost control of his temper. The fright he'd had finding Mokuba wasn't in the house, from Sarah of all people, had nearly given him a heart attack. "But you are bull headedly refusing to see reason! It isn't safe for you to run around the way either of us want you to! I'm not your opponent, Mokuba, stop acting like I am!"

That had Mokuba faltering slightly. "You… you don't care that I'm not at home with you?"

"No!" He yelled, ready to pull out his hair. His brother was going to make him age during his adolescence, he could see that. "But I need you to be reasonable about it! I know you understand that you aren't safe! Why are you fighting me so hard about this?"

"That's not fair!" Mokuba seethed.

"I can't make it fair!" He snarled. "What do you want me to do? I can't change who we are! I can't change that you're valuable to Kaiba Corp or important to me! The entire world knows that, Mokuba! So what's your solution?" Mokuba pressed his lips together and glared at the floor, clearly with no way around any of that. Seeing he had at least temporarily won he lowered his voice again, truly striving to be calm. "Why did you go to Sarah's?" Of all the places he could have run to he thought Sarah's was likely the safest, but that didn't change the fact that he had snuck out of the house, or been on his own the whole way there.

"I don't know." Mokuba replied as he threw himself back down at the edge of his bed, flopping over it dramatically. He stared at his brother, waiting him out. There was clearly a reason. Finally, Mokuba broke. "She's nice I guess." He told him. "And she always seems lonely so I figured she wouldn't mind me showing up. That and I knew you wouldn't flip out if you came there and she was with me."

"What?" He demanded.

"Everyone says she's your favorite at Kaiba Corp and that you never get mad at her. And Yugi said she was your friend at school."

"Why are you talking to Motou?" He growled even as he wondered what sort of gossip mill he was running at his own company. Or what about his behavior toward her was so different than anyone else that did their job correctly was.

"I play duel monsters at his shop on Thursdays with a bunch of other people. He runs table tourneys." He didn't even bother to ask how long that had been going on, and no matter how much he wanted to forbid his brother from associating with those people he knew now was not the time to broach that subject. One battle at a time. Mokuba went on. "You could have told me you made a friend, nii-san."

He ignored this. "Well, I'm glad you like her." He told him neutrally. "As she's going to be your new English tutor."

Mokuba sat back up. "What?" He asked, appalled. "I don't need a tutor!"

"Yes, you do." He told him, and that was very true. If his teacher at school couldn't make that happen he was fine with hiring in. It was wonderfully convenient that he already employed the most gifted translator he had ever heard of. "You need to be fluent in English. There's no getting around that. You're starting tomorrow after school. She'll meet with you here."

"I have to work on school after school?" Mokuba whinned.

He had very little sympathy about an extra hour of school work a day after what he'd been through. His brother was being ridiculous. "Enough, this is something that we won't be debating. It's vital you can do this." Mokuba crossed his arms and he was sure he would get no more bend from him tonight. "We can discuss the rest of this tomorrow."

"Whatever." Mokuba replied.

Pressing his lips together he stepped back out of the room. "Goodnight, Mokuba."

"Ugg, goodnight, alright?"

Fighting the urge to strangle him he had gone to bed, telling himself over and over that it was the hormones and he would level back out again. The next day Sarah had shown up as he predicted she would, and he assumed everything was going well as she told him Mokuba seemed to be doing fine and his brother hadn't run out of the house again. Still, things continued to be strained and he kept hoping this would calm down sooner rather than later.

As he considered that the elevator lurched hard and he grunted in surprise, throwing his arm out to catch himself against the wall. Next to him Sarah staggered into the door, dropping her bag to the floor. There was a loud clatter as her tablet no doubt collided with her cell phone and who knew what else she dragged along with her. The cab lurched a second time and then ground to an abrupt halt. Irritated beyond measure he hit the emergency button as Sarah righted herself quickly. Nothing happened. With a muttered curse he yanked the box under the buttons open and grabbed the phone. He barked into it as soon as it connected, demanding an explanation. He was not pleased with the reply his custodial staff gave him. They assured him they would come look at the issue immediately and get back to him soon. He felt his eyes narrowing dangerously and he snapped rapid fire orders about taking care of this immediately and having Yuka delay their meeting by thirty minutes as he assumed they would be here much longer than he had any interest in, which was about ten more seconds. When he was done he slammed the phone down and crossed his arms in annoyance.

A few moments later Sarah dared to break the seething silence. "Are we going to be stuck in here for awhile?"

"Yes."

"How long?" She asked.

"I don't know." He snapped irritably.

Sarah asked no more questions, apparently deciding not to further agitate his temper. She shifted to the back of the elevator and he figured she just wanted to sit down or lean against the wall while they waited. Reaching into his pocket he pulled out his phone and called his secretary directly to be sure his orders were taken care of. As irritating as this was he supposed pushing a meeting back a few minutes was hardly catastrophic, especially when it was with only his people and no one from the other company. Yuka assured him she was e-mailing his entire team as they spoke and had already called the legal team's secretary to be sure she also passed the message along. Appeased by her efficiency he used the next ten minutes to go over a few other things he had been meaning to speak to her about over the course of the morning.

When he finished he hung the phone up, feeling calmer. Slipping the phone away he turned, figuring it would be a good time to get a real update on Mokuba's progress, or just talk to Sarah, he got a real shock. Sarah was trembling in the corner, her face white all the way through her normally pink lips, sickly white rather than the lovely porcelain color it normally was, and she was sweating heavily. "Sarah?" She didn't respond to him, her expression blank as she stared at nothing, her eyes dilated as her breath came out in ragged, painful sounding pants. He wasn't sure how he hadn't already noticed the noise.

"Sarah?" He said again, still getting no response. Reaching out he gripped her arm and shook her slightly. "Sarah!" She jumped badly and looked up at him, terrified. He eyed her critically, she had been fine only a few minutes ago, but something was clearly very wrong. "What's the matter with you? Are you sick?"

"No." She shied away from him, making herself even smaller as she huddled in the corner.

"You're shaking and covered in sweat." He pointed out unnecessarily.

She reached up and wiped her forehead. Her darkly colored sleeve came away moist and smeared with her pale coverup. Clearing her throat she responded in a quavering voice he thought she was trying very hard to control. "I don't like confined spaces."

He thought that was an understatement. While he had never seen anyone have a panic attack he thought she might well be on the verge of one. Her distress gnawed at him on a very primal level, upsetting him badly. "You don't like them or you can't be in them?"

Her voice was strained. "The second one." He didn't understand what would cause such a fear, but thought this wasn't the best time to ask. "How much longer will we be in here?" She whimpered.

"Not long." He lied, unconvinced that they wouldn't be here for at least the full thirty minutes he predicted if not longer. Sarah began to wring her hands and all at once the lights in the elevator began to flicker. Great, that was all they needed, to be plunged into darkness, he was sure that would help. But Sarah didn't seem to notice as she stood there and then he saw a flash behind him out of the corner of his eye. Turning his head, he saw that the buttons that were used to indicate a floor were lighting up at random and he frowned, having never seen anything like that before and wondering what kind of electrical failure was happening in this machine.

Frowning, he turned back around and was about to reassure her that he would call maintenance again, thinking that if she had a definite time line it might calm her down, when he noticed something that had the hair on the back of his neck sticking straight up. As her eyes darted around the elevator he saw an odd reflection in them. "Sarah?" He said calmly, trying to get her attention on him. She looked back up at him and took everything he had not to react as cold fear filled his belly.

Reflected in her sky blue eyes was the image of a snarling, enraged dragon. He recognized the beast on a deeply intimate level, as he had spent countless hours all but obsessing over his most treasured monster. Hell, he had built a whole theme park with his dragon as the main duel monster on display. He was sure some could argue that he had built a shrine to the blue eyes white dragon if pressed. The lights flickered again and the dragon bared it's teeth, ready to strike. Recalling clearly what this monster had been capable of in ancient Egypt, and not understanding in the slightest how any of this was possible after all the monsters had supposedly been locked in the shadow realm, he reacted at once. If his blue eyes had somehow reinhabited Sarah in this life she could easily use it to destroy this whole building, consciously or not. This ancient beast had killed hundreds of men, and he had been witness to more than one of it's slaughters in his last life.

"What was the first language you learned?" He asked abruptly, trying to get her out of her head and thinking about anything other than being stuck in a place that terrified her. It was the first thing that came into his head as he had been wondering that for some time. The blue eyes white dragon had always responded to her in their last life when she was afraid, enraged, or in mortal danger. No matter how unsettling this was he could only assume it would be the same now and even if they weren't in real danger her mind felt that she was. He needed to calm her down, now.

To her credit she tried to focus on him and he reached out quickly and caught her shoulder again, squeezing it gently to try to help her. "No one is going to hurt you while I'm here. You're safe." He told her calmly, not breaking eye contact. "Focus on me, focus on now." She licked her lips and he repeated his question. "What was the first language you learned?"

"E-English." She managed, stuttering as she tried to get her words out around the terror.

He huffed in amusement despite this very deadly situation. "After that?"

"Um, my-my mother taught me French. She was a French Canadian. I guess really I learned it at the same time as English."

"And then what?" He prompted, although she didn't really seem to be calming down at all and the dragon began to coil, the lights flickering faster.

She let out a strangled little whine in the back of her throat. "I learned Spanish and German at the same time."

"How?" He insisted.

"Both languages were electives at my school. I signed up for both so I could decide which one I wanted to learn. A bunch of people do that…" She tried to focus on the information and the image of the dragon began to shimmer away a little at a time. "But they were both so easy. I stayed in them the next semester instead of taking ceramics like I had been planning to. I was fluent in both at the end of that term."

"So you learned them both at once?" He asked, now only seeing her deep blue eyes as the last shade of the beast retreated.

"Yeah. I just kept using language programs after that." She reached behind her and clenched at the thin metal handrail around the elevator, her knuckles turning white in the fearsome grip. It seemed the action helped her ground herself. "When did you learn English?"

"I was ten." He told her, watching her closely as he slowly let go of her.

"I understand it's easier to learn before you turn twelve for most people."

"If you say so." He agreed, having heard that himself.

"Who taught you? You're very good, anyone would think it was your first language if you were in America." She asked her words slowing out of the mad rush they had been at, and it seemed to him she realized what he was doing and was trying to help him help her.

"One of my tutors."

She was confused. "Tutors? If you had tutors why did you go to high school?"

"I don't see why that matters to you." He told her, forgetting he should be calming her down rather than antagonizing her, but old wounds were hard to heal.

"All right, grumpy ass." He said nothing and she put her other hand on her face. "That was horrible to say." Her voice began to quaver and he was anything but mad. His eyes flew over her and she gripped the rail tighter as she tried and failed to control her breathing. He found his eyes darting back up to the overhead lights when she huddled up on herself. "I'm sorry." She was practically panting as she switched to English without realizing it. "I'm freaking out. I didn't mean it. You aren't an ass at all."

Crossing his arms he shifted so he wasn't directly in front of her, thinking that her feeling like she had even less space than she did wasn't helping. He made sure his shoulder was brushing hers, thinking perhaps the physical contact had helped before. "I went to high school so I could maintain custody over Mokuba."

Her eyebrows drew together as she slowly lowered her shaking hand. "I don't understand. What does high school have to do with custody?"

He sighed tiredly, glad the whole thing was behind him now. He hadn't even bothered to go to graduation a few weeks ago. He was no more proud of the diploma than he was of not finding a way to get out of having to get one. In the end school had only been a means to an end. "One of the conditions the state insisted on for me to keep him was that I prove I was responsible. Going to high school was part of that for some reason."

Past the fear in her eyes he saw she was seeing something in him he didn't want her to see. "So you were running this company and going to high school to keep Mokuba?"

"Yes." He agreed.

She searched his eyes. "Does he know that? Does he know why you were pushing so hard? Why you spent all the free time you had at school?"

"No." His eyes turned icy as he realized she could easily tell his brother that. It was the last thing he wanted, Mokuba knowing he had done even more than he thought for him. No matter what they were going through right now he knew Mokuba felt guilty about what he had been through so they could stay together. He had no interest in adding to that burden. "And you aren't to tell him that either."

"Wow."

"What?"

"I wish I had a brother like you." She told him with terrified sincerity.

He frowned slightly. "What are you talking about now?"

"I can't even imagine how safe you must make Mokuba feel. Is it scary?" She was asking him a real question. "Knowing how much he trusts you? I don't think I could handle that kind of responsibility."

He had no idea what to say to that. He stared at her blankly, as it had never really occurred to him that there was anything else to do but do everything in his power to keep his brother. It had never really occurred to him that it was something to be admired, only something that he needed to make happen so they would stay together. He saw her about to ask something else when the elevator lurched. She nearly toppled to the ground from the sudden drop and then the machine screeched to a halt. They both looked at the doors as they caught their balance and then there was a sound of metal scrapping. Ten seconds later and a maintenance worker had the doors pried open with a crowbar. They had been taken all the way down to the lobby and she nearly knocked the poor man holding the door open down in her attempt to escape.

Seeing she had forgotten her bag, again, he picked it up and followed her out much more calmly, although he was hiding a great deal of worried confusion. He spotted the very back of her exiting the building as fast as she could without all out running, through the front door and knew she was trying to get out into the open. He stopped briefly to talk to the maintenance worker, asking for a full diagnostic on not only this elevator but all of them the next day. He never wanted this to happen again. The man had bowed low, assuring him that he would take care of it at once. That done he followed after her, wondering how he kept ending up carrying her bag around with him. Stepping out into the afternoon sunlight he caught sight of her across the street by a large ornamental fountain with the Kaiba Corporation logo in the center. She had her hands on her hips and was taking deep breaths as she looked out toward the city skyline.

When he got to her he could see she was returning to a more normal frame of mind. "You leave these everywhere." He said in way of greeting as he set the bag down on the edge of the fountain.

She let out a ragged breath. "Yeah, I guess I do." He said nothing and after a few moments she spoke her face full of conflict. "You said focus on now." Her voice was quiet and hesitant and he didn't know why that was a problem for her. It had seemed to help at the time. She pushed her hair back out of her face. "You said no one would hurt me while you were here. Why would you have said that? Why would you think anyone would hurt me if you weren't with me?" He said nothing because she already knew why. Sarah was not stupid and he had slipped. At his silence she continued. "How long have you known?"

He didn't bother to lie. It would be pointless and insult her intelligence, a characteristic he admired about her. "Since you left my office the first day. You knew I could tell you were lying."

She was stoutly refusing to look at him. "Did you look up everything, Seto?"

"Yes. I needed to know I could trust-"

She didn't even let him finish that lie. "No, you wanted to know. It had nothing to do with trust at all. You don't trust anyone. You didn't trust me anymore after you found that out. It wouldn't have mattered what you found out."

He shifted slightly, refusing to admit he was uncomfortable at being caught snooping, or that for anyone else she would be right. But no matter how he tried to deny it to himself she was different. "Fine. I wanted to know."

Sarah was forcing her voice to stay low so no one nearby could hear them. "Why? Why does it matter? Why do you care? I'm a translator! That's all I am! That's all I want to be! I want to go to work and come home to my apartment! That's it! What has you so fixated on me?"

"I'm not fixated on you!" He hissed back, also not wanting to be overheard.

"Yes, you are!" She protested. Sarah was close to completely unraveling, he could see it written all over her. Tears started pooling in her eyes as she snarled at him. "I don't understand you at all! You come looking for me just so you can snip at me half the time! You ask me to come over to help Mokuba and then get angry when I'm there when you get home! Why can't you just leave me alone so I can go home and be by myself? I'm good at being by myself!"

"No one hurts you when you're by yourself." He agreed.

"No, they don't!" She realized what had happened a moment after the words left her mouth. She sent him a hateful glare as she panted in rage, the anger overruling the fear that had consumed her only a few minutes before. Honestly, he thought it was a better route for her to go. Unable to maintain eye contact she looked toward the busy street as she crossed her arms and tried to keep her tears at bay.

He moved toward her slowly, until he was as close as he could be in public without it looking compromising and she tensed all over. While he had looked into her past it hadn't been to upset her. He did regret that it looked that way. He spoke quietly, finding it easier to look at the water burbling out of the fountain than at her. "I meant what I said. I won't hurt you." He stated softly. That had her starting to tremble, because she knew he meant it, because he always meant what he said. "It was clever, getting here the way you did. Not many people could have pulled that off." There was a pause as she pulled herself together and he knew she didn't know what to say. He doubted she had expected praise over her very illegal trip here from him. "Go home, Sarah." He told her at last.

"I just need a few minutes and I'll be fine." She told him, although she was clearly struggling with all of this.

"This meeting can be moved to tomorrow. It's already three and you haven't had a day off in two weeks." He wasn't sure what to make of any of this, not on a real emotional level, and knew he was going to need some time to sort through everything that had happened over the last twenty minutes. What was worse was that she was so clearly still upset. He disliked that immensely, but even beyond that he was concerned about what he had seen when she got that way. He was concerned about the dragon he had seen resting inside her and ready to defend her. "I'll tell Mokuba you won't be over today."

"I can go to the meeting." She insisted. "I know that was crazy, but I'm fine. I can do it."

"I believe you." He told her sincerely. "But I want you to go home and relax for the rest of the day."

"Seto-"

"Everything is fine, Sarah." He assured her. "Go home now. I'll see you tomorrow."

She was frustrated with the dismissal, but didn't fight him on it. He thought she was too tired from everything to manage it. "Alright." She relented as she picked her bag up. He started to go back inside when she stopped him. "Seto?" He turned back to her. "I'm sorry I lied to you. I didn't want to, I never did, but I needed this job."

"You shouldn't be ashamed of taking care of yourself the only way you could. You did what you had to do to survive. I understand that, probably better than most people."

Her shoulders relaxed and he could see she was relieved by the acceptance. "Thank you, for letting me stay."

"You do your job." He replied with a shrug. "I don't let you stay, you keep yourself here." That said he headed back inside, seeing her walking toward the other side of the building toward the underground garage as he went back in. When he got back to his office, in a working elevator he had Yuka move the meeting yet again and shut his office door. He needed to think.